work in progress
by bucketgirl55
Summary: Sam and Annie bit, but the others are of course in there as well.
1. Chapter 1

„Spend the night with me…no questions, no answers…just you…and me…" Sam said, his eyes pleading with Annie to say yes. But Annie backed up slightly. Was that all she was to him? A one-night stand? He had told her that he would go away soon. This wouldn't work. She couldn't just give in for one night and then have him disappear.

"I can't spend the night with you…," she returned and hurried out of Sam's flat. Outside, she hoped that he would come after her, beg her to stay; but he didn't. His door remained shut.

That told Annie all she needed to know. She hurried down the stairs and out of the building. She felt as if she was suffocating. Annie just couldn't understand him, or make sense of her own feelings right now. She knew he loved her, although he had never really said so. But over the past few months, she had seen his glances over to her, his concern for her safety. After all, he had made her a WDC. But every time she thought she loved him too, he would say or do something that would make her wonder. Sam hadn't talked about things from the future for a while now. At least not as much as he used to, back when he had arrived at A-Division. Sam Tyler still was the odd man out, but lately; he had at least tried to blend in a bit more.

Annie realised she was almost running by now, tears streaming down her face. She was so confused. She cared deeply for Sam, so much it sometimes hurt, but he always somehow managed to make her angry. And deep inside she knew he didn't even mean to do so. That was what made it so difficult for her to either ignore or get over him. He would never do anything to deliberately hurt her. Except for that one time when he had led that murder inquiry. He had handed over a tape recording of Ray and Chris conducting an interview that later led to Billy Campbell's death. Sam had been willing to demolish all their careers, their lives. But Superintendent Rathbone had destroyed that tape and so it had been over. And even then, Annie couldn't stay angry at Sam for long.

Annie stopped hurrying down the street. She didn't even know where she was – she hadn't been paying attention.

"Oh for good's sake Annie, grow up!" she said aloud to herself, angry. Angry that Sam always managed to catch her off-guard, confuse her, even if he wasn't there.

"He's just a lad, like all the others!" she tried to tell herself.

And that was exactly the problem. Sam Tyler wasn't like all the others. He always treated her with respect, like a human being. In fact, he treated almost everybody with respect, even suspects. He always did or said things that left her wondering. Wondering if he really was from 1973 or if all those things he had been telling her about in the past months was true after all and he was from the future.

"Don't be ridiculous!" she said aloud again, this time almost jumping at her own voice.

She shook off the thoughts of Sam Tyler and took a deep breath.

Annie looked around – now she knew where she was again. There was a little shop around the corner, where she could get something to drink. A cold Lucozade would be nice. All those thoughts and the arguing in her head had drained her. At least that was what she felt like right now. Exhausted. She never had this happened to her before, at least not over a man.

Annie turned the corner. A van was parked in front of the shop with its engine running. The female Detective Constable didn't think much of it, until several men came running out. They were wearing black ski masks and shotguns. In the distance, police sirens came closer. Annie stopped dead, taking everything in within seconds.

One of the men stopped when he saw her. Before Annie could react, the man was next to her, holding his gun to her head.

"Get in!" she heard a hoarse male voice.

Sirens were coming closer, while Annie's mind was racing. Back-up would turn around that far corner any moment. Maybe if she could…

"I said get in!" she heard the man beside her again.

He took the gun away from her head, only to push her forward towards the van.

"Move it!" He pushed her again; making her fell into the van, hitting her head hard.

And before any police car arrived at the scene, the van and Annie were gone…

Sam Tyler was sitting on his bed, his head resting in his hands; thinking. What had he done wrong? Why hadn't Annie stayed with him? What else could he have done to tell her that he cared for her? Sam knew he was going home soon. Home to 2006, back to his real life. Part of him was still convinced that none of this life he had in 1973 was real. But another part of him – a growing part actually – was starting to care for these people he worked with every day.

But he really cared for Annie Cartwright. She had been the one person listening to his story. And she hadn't put him in an institution. Yet. These two sides inside of him where at a constant battle and it was starting to drive Sam mad. He just wanted Annie to be there, to feel her close, to smell her. He didn't have anyone else in this world…

The door to his flat flew open with a crash, making Sam jump off his bed, and ending up on the floor. Gene Hunt was in the doorway, with his light brown, camel-hair overcoat, dark brown trousers and egg-shell coloured loafers.  
"Don't you ever just knock?" Sam sighed, getting up from the floor again.  
"Come on Gladys, job to do! Robbery. Let's go!" Hunt ordered in his usual tone of excitement, clapping his hands to make Tyler hurry. Sam knew he couldn't argue with his DCI, so he just grabbed his black leather jacket and followed him out.

The door would need some re-adjustments, but he would do that later. This hadn't been the first time Hunt had knocked his door down, and Sam suspected it wasn't the last time either. But what was he saying? He would be out of his coma soon, going back to his own time, so why should he bother?  
"You coming or what?" he heard Hunt yell after him.  
That was why he bothered. He was a policeman. No matter what year it was.


	2. Chapter 2

Just a few minutes later, the bronze Cortina came to a hold with squeaking tires. Both Hunt and Tyler got out. While the DCI stormed into the little shop, Sam stood by the car for a moment, taking it all in. Several police cars were parked around the shop in awkward angles, their lights still on, painting the surrounding houses in a blue pattern. This shop was only a couple of blocks away from his flat, Sam realised, and he remembered he had been shopping in there a few times. Then suddenly, it hit him.  
_The room had changed. It was bigger now, colder, and full of shelves and refrigerators. Music was playing through the intercom system. It was sterile. So cold…_

"Earth to Tyler!"  
Sam realised that Gene was talking to him.   
"Wha'?"  
"Work to do, ey?" Gene returned and went back into the shop, with Sam following this time. Tyler stopped again when he noticed tyre markings on the street. He knew the whole A-Division was there, so without looking up, he called Chris.  
"Get me a picture of these markings," he said, leaving it to Chris how to do that.  
Chris, being eager to please, hurried off with a "yes, boss". Even if this Tyler lad was acting very strangely sometimes, Chris had come to admire him for his focus on forensics. Chris was always learning something new around him and he liked that. The young DC loved to learn new things. So when he saw a journalists with a camera snapping pictures of the scene of the crime, he went over to him, confiscated his camera and took some shots of the tyre markings instead. 

The shop was very small, only one shelf in the middle and a counter with a register to the left of the entrance. The walls were filled with well stocked shelves, holding most goods you would need, from canned foods to band-aids.  
The shelf in the middle, however, wasn't as neatly stocked anymore. Candy was lying all around and Sam recognised some smashed Curly Wurlys on the floor. In the middle of all that harmless candy was a male victim. A puddle of blood had formed next to his head.  
Sam felt a pinch in his stomach. He knelt down to feel a pulse, but the man was already dead.  
"Damn," he cursed under his breath when he got up again.  
"We're gonna nail these bastards!" Gene added, though addressed to no-one in particular.

"How much did they get?" Sam wanted to know, as if that made any difference.  
"30 quid's," Ray Carling returned; chewing gum. He had been checking the register.  
Sam closed his eyes in anguish, when he heard something. It was coming from a small room in the back of the shop. He had missed the door on first sight, since it was the same colour as the walls surrounding it.

"Did anyone hear that?"  
"What? I didn't hear anything," Ray said, working his cigarette.  
But Gene looked at his DI. He hadn't heard anything either, but by now he trusted him enough to know when to listen to him. Sam went closer to the door and listened. There it was again. A faint crying sound. And this time, Hunt had heard it as well. He nodded over to Sam to open the door. He carefully opened the door, but only a bit to take a peek inside. His eyes needed a moment to get used to the dim light in that back room, but when they had adjusted, he opened the door wide enough to slip through and enter the room.  
"P'lice, show yourself!" Sam demanded from whoever was hiding in here.  
When he didn't get an answer, he looked back to Hunt through the opened door. Again, Gene nodded to tell Tyler to go ahead.  
Sam stepped deeper into the room, his neck tingling with excitement. He was fully alert that at any moment, someone could attack him. He looked around and saw a bed on the left side, a small table with a television set on the right, next to a chair. On the bed, he found the source for the crying.

"Oh my God," Sam whispered when he saw a small infant bundled up on the bed.  
"Guv!" he called his superior. The governor came into the room, following Tyler's look and found the baby as well.  
"Bastards," was all he said.  
"What do we do with..."  
Sam stopped. He didn't even know if the baby was male or female. The baby started crying again, it was clearly unhappy. Sam bent down and carefully lifted the small human being up into his arms, gently striking its head.  
"It's okay, you're safe now," he tried to comfort it. And while Gene only rolled his eyes, the baby stopped crying, curiously looking at that unfamiliar face.  
Sam started cradling it without thinking about it.  
"Well Gladys, seems it likes you, though I don't see why..." Hunt said and left the room again, shouting for DS Carling and DC Skelton.

When Sam finally left that back room as well to join the others, his superior already knew the victim's name.

"James Benson," he said, tilting his head towards the spot where the body was.

"And it's a girl," he added, pointing at an "it's a girl" greeting card on the counter next to the register.

"Let's take you home then," Sam said to the girl, who had now fallen asleep in the Detective Inspector's arms.


End file.
